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A rising force in global private equity and financial services, Dinu Patriciu is Chairman and CEO of The Rompetrol Group, NV (TRG), a multinational petroleum company headquartered in theNetherlands, operating in 13 countries, and with the majority of its assets and income located in Romania, France and South Eastern Europe. Patriciu led an investor buyout of Rompetrol SA in 1998, served on the Supervisory Board of the company since its establishment, and took over as the full time CEO in 2001. Formerly, Patriciu acted as Chairman of the Investment Committee of the Romania and Moldova Direct Fund, LP, an American-managed private equity investment fund established in 1998 whose investors include theInternational Finance Corporation and the German Government-owned DEG. [2]
Patriciu led Rompetrol from a state-owned Romanian oil services company into one of the top 25 oil operators in the European Union, principally through a program of strategic acquisitions and organic growth. This program started with the purchase of the Vega refinery (1999), continued with Petros SA (2000) and the purchase of a majority stake in Petromidia SA (2001), owner of the most modern refinery and petrochemical complex in Romania. Subsequently, TRG embarked on an international expansion program in the Balkan region, inMoldova, Georgia and Ukraine, as well as acquiring Dyneff Group SA of France, [3] the largest independent distributor of oil products in France, at the end of 2005. This latest acquisition, along with the development of its Swiss-based trading arm, Vector Energy, transformed TRG into a bridge between Eastern European natural resources and Western European energy demand.
Patriciu owns the Romanian daily Adevărul.[4] As of August 2008, he was also in the process of buying the Ukrainian tabloid Blik fromRingier.[5]
Dinu Patriciu is also the founder and chairman of the Dinu Patriciu Foundation, a non-governmental organisation which aims at offering financial support to talented young people who are not in the position to further sustain their studies.
Burkle's investments and transactions include:
Sir Richard's Five Secrets of Business Success.
Tom Gores founded Platinum Equity in 1995 with the intent to acquire, transition, and create significant value in non-core or underperforming divisions of Fortune 1000 corporations.
Since the Company’s founding, Platinum Equity has been recognized as one of the largest and fastest growing private companies in America, most recently ranking #27 on Forbes’ Largest Private Companies list for 2009 and #1 on the 2009 Los Angeles Business Journal list of LA's Largest Private Companies.
Through Platinum Equity, Tom Gores owns a portfolio of operating companies in a broad range of business markets including industrial, logistics and distribution, manufacturing, media, real estate, telecommunications, technology, and business services. Gores make his investments through a diversified capital base that includes the assets of Platinum Equity's portfolio companies as well as private equity funds backed by capital commitments from public and private institutional investors.
Tom Gores has driven the rapid growth of Platinum Equity to a multi-billion-dollar revenue base in just over 14 years. Today, Platinum has acquired $27.5 billion in annual revenue, and over 100 companies in a wide variety of industries.
How Alimentation Couche-Tard's bid for Casey's General Stores has progressed over the past five months.
— March 9: Alimentation Couche-Tard approaches Casey's with US$36 per share cash offer.
— April 9: Couche-Tard goes public with bid and earns US$10 million profit after selling nearly two million Casey's shares for US$38.43.
— June 8: Casey's board rejects offer for the second time.
— July 22: Couche-Tard increases offer to US$36.75.
— July 28: Casey's board rejects new offer, announces US$500 million recapitalization plan that will ultimately purchase 26 per cent of shares for US$38 per share.
— Sept. 1: Couche-Tard increases offer to US$38.50.
— Sept. 2: 7-Eleven approaches Casey's with preliminary US$40 cash offer.
— Sept. 7: Casey's board rejects Couche-Tard's revised offer and authorizes talks with 7-Eleven.
— Sept. 23: Casey's holds annual general meeting; elects new board.
— Sept. 30: Couche-Tard offer set to expire.
The deal is still in progress and is getting hotter with 7-Eleven jumping in. "Casey's with its strong franchise and thick carpet coverage of Midwest will be someone's prized possession. I see Couche-Tard and 7-Eleven fighting harder, and possibly third parties joining in. I think there are at least two or three other groups that could be a great fit with Casey's, The Pantry Corp. being one of them and their bankers must be sleeping if The Pantry is not in the game yet".said Armen Grigorian of Defoe Partners.
Rosenstein’s and his Jana Partners are activist shareholders, employing heavy-duty research to help him spot special situations in the public-securities realm. Then he unleashes hell, most famous being Rosenstein letter from last year, filed with the SEC and attacking the Houston Exploration Company, included the following scathing conclusion: “In sum, this board appears to have a perverse desire to destroy shareholder value.”
Volkert Doeksen of AlpInvest Partners (originally NIB Capital). Being connected with Dresdner Kleinwort and Warburg Pincus, invests in club deals. Alumni of Kleinwort Benson, Dillon Read and Mortgan Stanley.
Howard Mark Lorber works through Vector Gorup Ltd., a NYSE listed holding company. Took control of Gouglas Elliman ight before NYC real estate taking off, which helped this largest residential real estate brokerage in the New York City area. He is also chairman of Nathan Foods and is part of the New Valley Corp (Western Union) and works financial magic through Aegis Capital and Ladenburg Thalman, both boker-dealers.
Attended Tulane University and transferred before eventually graduating with his BA in economics from the University of Pennsylvania. He also manages a charitable organization called Steel Partners Foundation that is a significant donor to building of a first Jewish synagogue in Aspen, Colorado.
During the 80s he was a corporate raider, using debt provided by Drexel Burnham Lambert. Successful targets of his raids were the GAF Materials Corp. and International Specialty Products. He also made large sums of money in failed take-overs of Borg-Warner and Union Carbide. He has recently been involved in takeover attempts on Dexter, London Stock Exchange and Hercules Corp.
He achieved notoriety in Australia during the Qantas takeover when his hedge fund, declined to accept Airline Partners Australia's offer for his share, and after the failure of the offer subsequently accepted for over half his holding, although this was unsuccessful. As his total holding was said to be 10% of Qantas' shares, he had at risk over a billion dollars (Australian) in shares, and was possibly in violation of Qantas foreign shareholding rules.
His personal investment career began when he took over the reins at his family-controlled conglomerate Bolloré, which deals in maritime freight and African trade, and paper manufacturing. The company he leads today employs 33,000 people around the world.
He is a well-known corporate raider in France who has succeeded in making money by taking large stakes in French listed companies, in particular the building and construction group Bouygues, where he left with a sizeable capital gain after a power-struggle.
In 2005, through his family company, Bolloré expanded his media interests by launching the Direct 8 television station. Towards the end of 2005, he began building a stake in independent British group Aegis.As at 19 July, 2006, his stake in Aegis stood at 29%. Direct Soir, a free newspaper, was launched in June 2006. In January 2008, he manifested interest in becoming a shareholder of famed, but troubled, Italian car manufacturer Pininfarina.
He is a close personal friend of French President Sarkozy. It has been told that their friendship goes back over 20 years Sarkozy has been criticized for accepting vacations from Bolloré; however, both have insisted that no conflict of interest exists.
His greatest contribution was probably the strong support he showed, at very crucial initial stages, to the Special Olympics. Jacobs founded FLW Outdoors, the parent organization of the Wal-Mart FLW Our, a series of sportfishing tours best know for its bass fikshing tournaments, which were developed with an eye toward media coverage in general and television coverage in particular.
CAN BE PROUD OF: According to Fast Company, Khosla’s six best deals for the venture-capital outfit Kleiner Perkins turned $314 million of seed money into $15 billion in cash and stock.
ON THE RECORD: “The main problem to solving problems is having the problems be critical enough to get attention It’s almost like a crisis is a terrible thing to waste.”
CAN BE PROUD OF: Eurasia Center, a non-profit think tank based in London, and his short but very productive tenure as prime minister of Armenia. Armenia has seen explosive growth 1998 - 2006 period, mainly due to Sarkissian's road map of economic freedom initiatives and overall growth.
CRUCIFIXION-AVOIDANCE MOVE: Donated $15 million to a legal fund for families fighting foreclosure.
MANIFEST DESTINY: In the mid-1990s, Paulson, 52, bought a New York apartment and a mansion in the Hamptons at foreclosure sales.
NEIGHBOR RELATIONS: Reportedly persuaded Comcast’s Brian Roberts, a longtime client, to buy out a Martha’s Vineyard neighbor that Rattner, 56, had feuded with.
BIG DEAL: New York mayor Michael Bloomberg announced in January that he was putting his wealth (estimated at more than $11.5 billion) under Quadrangle’s management to avoid any conflicts of interest.
HIRING TECHNIQUE: “Given the choice between cutoffs and sandals or cuff links and Brioni, we’re going to take the first every time.”
QUOTE: “We had the good fortune of seeing a lot of the things and habits that tend to lead to the downfall and demise of young companies, and it’s helpful to have a litany of them to refer to from time to time.”
BIG NEW FRIEND: Oprah, now a partner, via Malone’s Discovery Communications, in OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network.
LABEL-DEFYING MOVE: Wall Street was convinced that Malone, 67, would take control of DirecTV, the country’s biggest satellite-TV service, and flip it for another asset. But so far Malone appears to be interested in operating the service in conjunction with Liberty’s cable programming.
ON THE RECORD: Malone, quoted in a Wall Street Journal article that later became a key point of contention in the Liberty Media/IAC trial: “There was a time when there was, I think, a 20 percent Barry premium” on Wall Street. “Today you could argue there is a Barry discount.”
NEW LITTLE ENEMY: Comedian Lewis Black targeted Kravis, 64, and K.K.R. in another Web video, railing against what he sees as their unfair earnings.
BIGGEST GAFFE: Last May, just before the market meltdown, he told a group of Canadian investment heads, “The private-equity world is in its golden era right now. The stars are aligned.”
MODE OF TRANSPORT: A Gulfstream GV.
LITTLE BUDDY: Monica Seles.
ROMANTIC RELATIONS: Forstmann, 68, is currently dating Top Chef hostess Padma Lakshmi. He insists his past relationships with Princess Diana and Elizabeth Hurley were purely platonic.
RECENT DEALS: Belgian brewer InBev’s $52 billion purchase of Anheuser-Busch, the K.K.R. public offering, and the sale of Bear Stearns to J. P. Morgan Chase.
MAKEOVER BONA FIDES: Wasserstein, once chubby and rumpled, is now slim and crisply dressed.
SPOUSAL RELATIONS: In July the New York Daily News reported that Wasserstein, 60, had separated from third wife Claude and was involved with a “young Asian beauty.”
RECENT DEALS: Large stock positions taken and pressures applied on General Motors and Ford Motors Company.
LITTLE BUDDY: Steve Schwarzman. (Lord Rothschild, 72, is on the International Advisory Board of Schwarzman’s Blackstone Group.)
PRIZED POSSESSION: His personal collection of some 15,000 bottles of Rothschild wines dating back to 1870.
BIG LOSS: Alwaleed, 53, lost billions when Citibank’s stock price collapsed because of the subprime-mortgage crisis—and he joined with other big investors to infuse $12.5 billion in new capital into the troubled bank. But his losses were partly mitigated by gains from his holdings in the Four Seasons and Fairmont hotel chains, which have thrived in the Middle Eastern market.
WINGS: Boeing 747-400 while he waits for delivery of his $310 million Airbus A380 Flying Palace. It’s expected that the superjumbo jet will have a gym, formal dining rooms, and a cinema. It’s so big that it can land only at airports in major cities.
CRIB: 317-room palace in Riyadh. It features four separate kitchens for four different cuisines: Lebanese, Arabian, Continental, and Asian.
EVIDENCE OF POSSIBLY EXCESSIVE BEHAVIOR: Travels with a staff of 60.
LATEST ACT OF DO-GOODERY: Donated $15.7 million apiece to Cambridge University and the University of Edinburgh to build new Islamic-studies centers.
RARE MISSTEP: Slim, 68, spent $2 billion to buy CompUSA, but couldn’t make the business work despite repeated turnaround attempts. He shuttered the last of the stores and sold the brand earlier this year.
COOL FRIEND: Shakira.
CLOUD OF UNCERTAINTY: The Mexican government is confronting Slim’s telephone dominance, forcing him to open up to a competitor.
AESTHETE BONA FIDES: His blossoming collection of Rodin sculptures and Renoirs places him among the world’s top art spenders, according to ArtNews.
COOL FRIEND: Lenny Kravitz.
RECENT ANOINTMENT: Awarded the 23rd spot on Details magazine’s Power 50 list, apparently because he has “taken over the space in your head.” Not sure what that means.
MOGUL BONA FIDES: An early investor in Bob and Harvey Weinstein’s company, Nevo recently invested in online music site Buzznet and Internet-based ad agency Spot Runner alongside Rupert Murdoch and Herb Allen’s Allen & Co.
EVIDENCE OF POSSIBLY CONTRADICTORY BEHAVIOR: Two years after “firing” Tom Cruise, Redstone announced he’d work with the actor again after all, in yet another Mission: Impossible movie: “He’s a great actor and behaving very well these days.”
SWORN ENEMY: Mortality. Addressing succession plans in a recent interview, Redstone, 85, said, “I’m not worried about it ’cause it’s going to be another 20, 30 years.”
BIG DEALS: Advised Murdoch on his takeover of Dow Jones. The firm also guided NBC Universal on its $925 million purchase of Oxygen Media, the TV channel backed by investors Oprah Winfrey and Paul Allen.
MAN-OF-THE-PEOPLE MOVE: Wrote a New York Times op-ed calling for taxation on investment income of the endowments of the wealthiest colleges and universities (including his own alma mater, Williams College).
SIDE PROJECT: Allen is helping fund the former Major League Baseball commissioner Fay Vincent’s oral-history-of-baseball project.
BOATING BUDDIES: Denzel Washington, Penny Marshall, and Saif Qaddafi (son of Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi) attended Perelman’s birthday party on his 188-foot Ultima III yacht in St. Barth’s in December.
EX-SPOUSAL RELATIONS i: Third wife Patricia Duff re-entered the picture this year when Caleigh, her 13-year-old daughter with Perelman, sought a protective order (aided by Perelman’s lawyers) against her mother. (Duff counters that the animosity stems from normal teenage angst.)
EX-SPOUSAL RELATIONS ii: Perelman, 65, exercised the naming rights he received from a $20 million donation to his alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, renaming Logan Hall after his second wife, the late gossip columnist Claudia Cohen. It is located in the Perelman Quadrangle. In July, he also sued Cohen’s brother over her fortune, which daughter Samantha is entitled to.
EX-SPOUSAL RELATIONS iii: Perelman and fourth wife Ellen Barkin are locked in a legal squabble over the funding of her production company, Applehead. He claims Barkin and her brother are misappropriating Applehead’s capital; she alleges that Perelman didn’t cough up the cash he promised.
CASTING CALL: Told CNBC’s Donny Deutsch that he would want Robert Downey Jr. to play him in a biopic.
